This graduate course will critically examine social work practice with military personnel, veterans, and their families in various military, veteran, and community settings (i.e., Veterans Hospitals, Military Treatment Facilities, Family Advocacy Programs, VET Centers, Family Readiness Centers). From a multidisciplinary perspective, this course will provide students with a comprehensive overview of the military as an organization, work and life experiences of military personnel and families within military organizations, the military deployment cycle, and types of military deployments. This course will also examine how social, political, and contextual factors influence mental health, psychosocial, and behavioral outcomes and treatment-seeking behaviors among military personnel and veterans. Deployment stressors and post-deployment mental health (i.e., posttraumatic stress disorder, mild traumatic brain injury, depression, substance use, suicide) from the Iraq and Afghanistan wars will be reviewed as well as lessons learned from previous wars (e.g., Vietnam, Persian Gulf War) that have clinical social work practice implications. The role of psychological stigma, social, systemic, and organizational barriers to care will be explored as well as racial, spiritual/religious, familial, and gender differences among military personnel, veterans, and their families. Students will also learn about Department of Defense and Veterans Administration policies (e.g., sexual harassment/sexual assault, military sexual trauma, limits of confidentiality, Yellow Ribbon Program, Wounded Warrior) that impact the provision of mental health services to military personnel and veterans. Mental health practice implications for individual and group treatment modalities will also be examined.

Note that this information may change at any time. Please visit the Student Link for the most up-to-date course information.